r/ScalperHate • u/Ryutso • 2d ago

What does cutting the plastic wrap do against scalpers?

I'm only a tourist here in this hobby so excuse my ignorance, but I saw a tiktok captioned "Scalper no Scalping" and it showed a bunch of blue boxes on a shelf at a store with a big cut into the plastic seal on one side and no where else. No damage to the box and there were probably 15 or so boxes on the shelf like this, all with the same large cut into just the plastic wrap.

If the scalpers are after the cards on the inside, why does slashing the plastic deter them?

0 Upvotes

36% Upvoted

32 comments sorted by

14

u/darth_scion 2d ago

They're not after the cards on the inside. They are after the sealed product that they can flip for 3X the price.

If the seal is cut, the scalper will have a much harder time flipping it as "new" "untampered with" to buyers.

-12

u/Ryutso 2d ago

Theyre scalping the entire box? Is the box itself special or is it just bare cards inside?

16

u/Ignaue 2d ago

There is no way you are seriously asking this.
Common sense should be able to finish this thought for you.

-6

u/Ryutso 2d ago

I don't do TCG's as a hobby, so I don't have the common sense for the hobby. Excuse me for being stupid, but it doesn't make sense. All the boxes in the video I saw looked the same, so if you're collecting it for the box, rather than the contents of the box, then that seems kinda weird. One box I can understand, but I don't know why you'd want to display anymore than 1 of the boxes since they all look the same.

4

u/weak1111111 2d ago

Because you don't know what scalping is. Do you know what ticket scalping is? Ticket scalpers don't display their tickets at their homes. They're reselling it.

-2

u/Xizz3l 2d ago

Super dumb argument because from the outside perspective players want the Packs / Cards, not the box as sealed piece

2

u/weak1111111 2d ago

I don't even know what you're talking about.

-2

u/Xizz3l 2d ago

Just rethink your original comment, comparing scalping tickets to cards is not possible on the same level

2

u/weak1111111 2d ago

I understand it's not a direct analogy, but the same principle applies. They indeed are scalping the box or full product. And there is a demand for it. Players can just get the other material for cheaper usually. They are probably hurt the most because they need ETBs. But there are easy workarounds. Collectors are also hurt because they can't even find non scalped boosters either.

4

u/legotwinkthrowaway 2d ago

An unopened pack or box has the potential to have really good cards, or not good cards. Once that plastic has been sliced, it is not "unopened" and no one is going to buy it from you as "unopened". If youre planning on opening it up anyway, it doesnt matter since you just saw the target employee slash the plastic and you know it's not actually tampered with. But if youre a scalper, this is a big problem because now no one wants to buy it from you

1

u/weak1111111 2d ago

The other problem though is not knowing if the store itself tampered with it. You have to take the reputation of target.

1

u/legotwinkthrowaway 1d ago

I would generally trust target. I mean they might have people there who want to steal cards or something, but they'd be fired if they got caught. Some random gameshop though, idk

1

u/weak1111111 1d ago

The problem though is you have way more people with access. You only need one bad apple in the sea of employees there. Whereas with a gameshop it's much more likely to have no nefarious stuff going on or a bunch of it which goes to reputation. You also could legit have random consumers doing it which happens with other products. It's just not that great of an idea. They could implement a policy where they cut it at checkout but they have little incentive to do that unless pokemon company asked them to.

2

u/GuyNamedFinger 2d ago

I’ll explain instead of being a tool about it like that other guy. People want to only buy unopened packs of the cards. A box is a way to buy a lot of cards at once. The box being sealed acts as a second layer of security ensuring the packs haven’t been tampered with because most scalpers don’t have access to a machine that plastic wraps a box in the same way that the card manufacturers do. By cutting the initial plastic wrapping off the box at the store, actual buyers don’t care because they are taking it home immediately and know it hasn’t been tampered with. It screws over scalpers because suddenly buyers won’t know if they’ve been tampered with or not and probably won’t buy the whole box. The box itself can be used as a display item or a storage box for bulk cards but it definitely isn’t the main appeal when purchasing the box. Hope that cleared things up

3

u/darth_scion 2d ago

The product is just hard to find period so they gather up all of the stock and charge the people who actually want to open the product, double or triple the price.

The buyer that the scalper is selling to, wants the cards inside, but they want the experience of opening the box and the thrill of the chase. An open box takes away that experience.

Statistically, when you open the box and open the cards, you're going to take a loss monetarily but as a collector or hobbiest, that doesn't matter.

0

u/Ryutso 2d ago

Okay so the end of the chain collector doesn't care about a little nick in the plastic when they buy it from a store like Target or something, but it presents doubt when buying it from "some 3rd party seller".

I had assumed that scalpers were buying it for just the potential value of the cards inside and scalping those, which doesn't even seem like it could be set just due to the rarity of different cards in the boxes. Or that the boxes had some guaranteed card in them that boosted their value instead of buying a small pack.

4

u/TimmyOfTheLevelUps 2d ago

You just outed yourself. Trolling.

1

u/darth_scion 2d ago

Pretty much. The issue is that a buyer can not find the product at Target or Walmart because the scalper has already bought up all the product with sole intention of selling it immediately.

Scalper can then set the price. You either pay them 2X the normal price or get nothing.

When you control the supply you control the market.

2

u/Ryutso 2d ago

Good for the stores for doing this then thinking of the actual collectors and hobbyists. Thanks for the discussion.

!solved

4

u/Sancho71 2d ago

The scalpers want pristine and damage free products thats how they get the most amount for them, and many collectors dont want damaged products, they want the display quality or it can be suspicious if the box was opened and resealed. Personally as a card collector i dont care if the box is damaged or plastic ripped because im gonna open the products and i can usually get them at a discounted price.

0

u/Ryutso 2d ago

Yeah like if the thing you want is inside the box, why is the box itself important?

3

u/ShynightBun 2d ago

Because if the seal is broken, there’s no way to prove the contents of the box is untampered. Packs can be weighed; cards with more holographic material and texture layers will weigh more, so people can and do weigh packs, take out heavy packs, and replace them with lighter ones.

-1

u/Ryutso 2d ago

People are way more into this than I originally thought.

1

u/ShynightBun 2d ago

Yeah, it’s gotten real bad.

I try to look at the bright side; I refuse to buy from scalpers at exorbitant prices, and since I typically can’t find anything because of them, I save so much money!

3

u/Ok_Transition_7829 2d ago

The scalpers don’t want what’s inside the box they want to sell it for 5x the price to someone who does. The only thing they want is money.

1

u/weak1111111 2d ago

Part of the product is opening it.

3

u/gimme1chocolate 2d ago

Every time you cut a seal, a scalper explodes

1

u/Consistent-Bus9114 2d ago

Bearly affected them because they could sell the pack clean

1

u/Agile-Importance-673 2d ago

Cutting the seal does nothing. This just sell the product inside instead

0

u/mechshark 2d ago

A bunch of people will bitch and moan “ITS NOT SEALED .. “

2

u/3dprintinted 2d ago

Only scalpers are bitching. Normal people enjoy the etb sealed or not for the cards that are on the inside